Bullets
by Haleine Delail
Summary: Martha gets herself into a major, ugly bind. The Doctor tries to get her out, but in order to save their lives, they have to cross a line that will change everything they thought they knew about each other, and their relationship. Be warned, this story is quite dark. Oneshot!


**As often happens when I am writing a larger piece, I just HADDDD to get this oneshot thing out of my system before I could possibly move on. So I'm still going strong with _Escape From Me, _but here is a new, quick, unrelated offering which will be interesting and evocative, but perhaps not exactly a happy endavor...**

**...because it is DARK. You have been warned. There is violence, and there is sex, and the two cannot, unfortunately, be entirely separated. And this is what causes the problem in the end, however you choose to see it.**

* * *

A Friday Night In New York

After taking off the scant gold lammé dress and lying down, exhausted in the damp, dark room, an Englishwoman heard whisperings from the girls in varying degrees of broken English, the only language they all had in common.

"All right, Elena?" asked on of them with a thick Russian accent.

"Okay," answered someone named Elena, someone with a Mexican twinge to her voice.

"This number four," the Russian said. "Yes?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"I safe," Elena said.

A pause, then, "I'm sorry."

"At least I not die."

The Englishwoman was confused. "Sorry," she said into the dark with her crisp Londoner's accent. "What happens with number four?"

At this question, she distinctly heard a breath catching, and whimpering from somewhere else in the dark. A long pause ensued, and then the Russian chose to answer.

"If no one choose you after four times…"

"What?"

"You… considered useless. You know what happen then."

"We're killed," the Englishwoman said flatly.

Neither the Russian nor anyone else spoke. She took that as assent.

Her own "number four" would be coming up in the next day or two. She wasn't sure whether she wanted to be chosen, or if it might actually be preferable to have them kill her.

Suddenly the door opened, and a harsh light came into the black, black room.

"Azteca, you're up again," a harsh, New Yorker's voice said. The voice belonged to a man named Michael Pallottola, and she would never forget that name as long as she lived. Though, that may not be saying much. "Get dressed now."

Elena's voice answered in the gloom, "But I have just performed. Please, I need rest."

Without a word, the lights were flipped on, and all fourteen girls instictively rolled themselves into little balls. Pallottola stalked into the room and hovered over Elena.

"I said, get dressed."

"You said I can rest after perform," she said. "It was fourth time, I was chosen. I need rest."

"Maybe you don't understand how this works. I am not _asking_, this isn't a goddamn fashion show, so get your fat ass up, bitch."

"Please, Mr. Pallottola…"

But the thug had heard enough. He dragged her out of bed by her hair and threw her to the floor. The other girls gasped, and a few of them lurched forward to try and help, but they were held off with the handgun at Pallottola's hip. He shouted out, "Boys! We have a shirker!"

With that, three more bulky men in suits showed themselves in the doorway, then came into the room and descended on the Mexican girl.

The Englishwoman tried to hide her eyes, but she could not.

Later, wrapped in a filthy blanket stained at the edges with Elena's blood, she padded down the hall as silently as possible. She knew she was taking her life in her hands, but she _had_ to get out of there. She found a phone in an abandoned, unlocked office and dialled the number.

"Martha? What's going on?" the Doctor's voice rang out across the miles.

"Doctor," she whispered, trying desperately not to break down. "You've got to get me out of here. This is so much worse than we thought. It's not anything like what we…"

But a hand then wrapped around her mouth and yanked her away from the phone.

* * *

The following night, once again, she was wearing the hated gold lammé dress with a push-up bra and matching black lace thong. Once again, she fidgeted with the dress because it barely covered her nether regions in the front and back. Once again, she winced as she walked down the hall in a pair of patent leather pumps that were a size too small for her feet. She caught a glimpse of herself in a pane of glass as she passed one of the offices. Her gold hoop earrings, iridescent pink eye-shadow and opaque, shiny lip gloss glinted in the unflattering fluorescent light. She wanted to cry, but she refused.

This was number four. Oh, God. There was just no way to win this one.

She was marched into a The Room, led by the bulky Pallottola in his black suit.

Already in The Room were five girls, all of whom younger than she. There were two waifish blondes with giant, sad blue eyes. They looked rather alike. There was an Asian girl, very small, very thin, very frightened. There was a somewhat buxom, trussed-up, tan-skinned Brazilian girl and a tall, freckled ginger girl with tumbling curls.

The Mexican girl was conspicuously absent.

The Englishwoman was the only one in the room who ever dared to make eye-contact. She had been warned that this might be one of the reasons why she may never be chosen. But she looked up anyway.

When she saw the client, her heart went _thud_ in her throat.

* * *

Two weeks earlier

"Who _are_ these people?" Martha asked, sitting on the single seat in the TARDIS console room, listening and re-listening to a series of disjointed soundbytes.

"I think they are people who have testified, or tried to testify," the Doctor told her. "Tried to squeal, I would imagine, with varying degrees of success."

He had showed her how to use the rewind, fast-forward, play and stop functions on the soundplayer on the console. She backed up the recording by a minute or so, and listened again to a collage of voices, all male, mostly Americans, a few Puerto Ricans.

"…they are trafficking them… only feeding them enough to…"

"…keep them in the dark, all packed together… totally inhumane and…"

"…aliens, all of them… it's sick and warped…"

"…filthy, it is… they keep them in filthy conditions, and they kill…"

"…there has to be some kind of universal law, doesn't there?..."

"…because they are aliens, they think they can do… and force them to perform…"

"…it's horrible, I'll never forget… what they're doing to these poor…"

Martha stopped the recording, having heard enough.

"What do they mean, _perform_?" Martha asked, frowning hard.

"I don't know," the Doctor said. "Could be a circus, could be a Stock Market thing… could be counting cards in Vegas. Trouble is, we don't know what kinds of aliens, we don't know how these men know about it or whether _performing_ is even a euphemism for something a lot more sinister."

"So, do you think that these guys are using the rift to suck them through, or is it a coincidence? And are the traffickers aliens themselves? Otherwise, how the hell would they know about any of this?"

"You're asking a lot of questions I can't answer, Martha," the Doctor shrugged. "And unfortunately, they are questions that nonetheless need answering. That's why I'm going in."

"You're going in where?"

"My contact at the NYPD said that they had pinned this operation down to a restaurant in Hell's Kitchen," he said. "Lower Manhattan. I'm going to go get a job."

"Are you kidding?"

"No, I've waited tables before, it'll be fine," he assured her.

"No, genius, think about it. You're _an alien_!" she shouted at him. "Once you're in, then you are trapped! You can't do any good then."

"I'm very good at passing for human," he said defensively.

"Yes! Amongst people who don't know aliens exist, but these people clearly know," Martha reasoned. "Plus, Doctor, they're tracking aliens down somehow. They probably have instruments."

"Martha…"

"What will you do if they have some kind of machine that picks up simple biological anomalies, which is, let's face it, the best place to start tracking down aliens in our midst? You have two hearts, Doctor. You'll never make it out of there alive. Or without being forced into… whatever it is they're forcing aliens to do there."

He lost his impetus, crossed his arms, and seemed to think. "Hm. You're right."

"Send me in."

"What? No, no, no, no," the Doctor protested. "I don't think so."

"Why not? I've waited tables before as well," she continued to reason. "I'm human, I'm clever. Much better at blending in."

"It's too risky."

"Why?"

"It just is!"

"Doctor. Do you want to find out what's going on in there or not?"

"Yes, of course."

"Then you need an agent on the inside, and it can't be you. That leaves me."

* * *

When the phone rang the following afternoon, the Doctor grabbed it on the first buzz. "Oi! How'd it go?"

"They love me," Martha replied.

"Well, yeah," he told her. "Of course they do."

"They kept calling me _exotic_ and fawning all over my accent."

"That's weird."

"No, it's not that weird. It's happened before when I've been in America."

"So you got the job?"

"Yeah," she said. "But here's the thing. They gave me kind of a hard time because I didn't have an address, so I said I was brand-new in town, and that I was still looking for something… it put them on the alert for some reason. So Doctor, I think you should lay low for a few days while I find an apartment. Just in case they're suspicious and surveilling me, seeing if I'm a copper or something."

"Okay," he agreed. "Are you sure?"

"It's only for a few days. I'll stay in a hotel until I get in someplace, and then I'll ring you as soon as I get settled in."

The Doctor sighed. "Martha, I still don't like this."

"I know, but I'm going to be okay. You'll see."

* * *

After a week, the Doctor finally received a call.

"Hello, Doctor," Martha said. She sounded a little flat. "How are you?"

"Just dandy," he said. "Been frantic, worried about you. Are you all right? Are you in?"

"I'm fine."

"You don't sound fine."

"I am. I'm just a bit tired."

"Martha, I just don't like the sound of this. I'm coming to get you."

"No!" she shouted, before she could stop herself. Even _he_ could hear that. "Do _not_ do that. I am fine."

"You are not fine! Martha, are you not free to say what you like right now?" he asked.

"Yes, you're right," she said, again, a bit flatly. "But there is no need to come. Please."

"Are you _certain_, Martha? I can tell something's wrong."

"Please. Do not come. I am fine."

He sighed. "Okay, if you say so. But you call me back _the second_ you can talk freely, yeah? You just say the word."

"Sounds good," she said. "Thank you, Doctor. Don't worry about me."

Then she cut off the call.

"Don't worry?" he asked the dead phone. "Fat chance."

* * *

Once a day for the next seven days, right around five in the evening, he received a call from Martha, just like this one. Each day, she assured him unconvincingly that she was doing all right, and that he should not come for her. He knew that he, in fact, _should_ come for her, but he also knew that someone or something was forcing her to keep in touch with her "loved ones" so that no-one would "miss" her, and that whoever this was would probably not take kindly at all to a rescue attempt, especially a botched one. And he was certain to botch it unless he had more information about who and what he was dealing with, and that would probably end very unpleasantly for Martha. These blokes were bad, if they knew how to traffic aliens right under the noses of the human race and law-enforcement, and probably would not hesitate to kill, to avoid an interplanetary prison. But, as long as Martha continued to ring, he could at least be assured that she was alive, while he plotted his next move.

On the seventh day, he received the five p.m. call, and then another in the middle of the night. The phone rang at his bedside (not that he was sleeping, or had slept more than a total of eight minutes in the last two weeks), and he saw that the call was coming from the restaurant where Martha "worked."

"Martha? What's going on?" the Doctor asked, desperately.

"Doctor," she whispered, trying desperately not to break down. "You've got to get me out of here. This is so much worse than we thought. It's not anything like what we…"

But then her voice went muffled, and the line went dead.

"Shit," he spat. He threw the phone across the room and stood up angrily. "This ends _now_."

* * *

A Saturday Night in New York

The Doctor sauntered into Mikey and Petey's Bar and Grill in Hell's Kitchen, and was greeted by a Maître d' of sorts. He was as tall as the Doctor, but swarthy, and by the looks of it, too young to be working there. Or anywhere else, on a school night.

"Good evening sir," the man said. "Table for one?"

"Actually," said the Doctor. "No. I'm really more interested in some kind of _entertainment_. Anything you can suggest?" His tone and approach were pointed, but vague, suggesting he knew what was going on, even though he didn't. He did all but say _nudge nudge_ to the young man.

There was a pause as the kid looked him over. "Here from out of town, are you?"

"Mm, here on business. Bit bored tonight."

"Looking for something _different_ to occupy your time?"

"Something like that," said the Doctor.

"It doesn't run cheap, sir."

"Not an issue."

"Follow me, please."

The young man led the Doctor into The Room. There, he was greeted by a pair of large men, introducing themselves as Michael and Peter Pallottola, owners of this establishment. Certain niceties were exchanged, money was exchanged, and the Doctor was asked to wait.

After five minutes, six young women were paraded into the room, each attractive and scantily clad, and none of them making eye-contact.

Except for one.

The woman on the end, clearly different from the others, dared to look at him squarely.

He kept his cool when he saw her, and she kept her cool when she saw him. Though, he knew her well, and he could see the relief wash over her.

The Doctor felt sick as realisation came over him, surprisingly slowly.

The Pallottola brothers were not trafficking aliens for some sort of weird, exotic enslavement. They were trafficking human women, illegal "aliens" for prostitution, and he had sent Martha striding straight into their clutches. It had been _her_ idea, but wasn't it his job to keep her out of danger?

And when he thought about it further, he felt sicker. How many times had Martha been brought into this room, to be displayed before some lusty, alcohol-drenched restaurant patron, for his use and/or amusement? How many times had she been forced to… _perform_?

He shivered, but shook off his disgust and began to focus, as one of the brothers began to talk. From right to left, Michael introduced the merchandise. "Meet Corinna, the fiery Irish treasure. Ipanema, the Brazilian beauty who just loves it below the equator. Ling-Ling, from Vietnam, she love you long time! Our twin Russian beauties, Tatianna and Natasha – they are a package for your package. And lastly, exotic Ashanti. Her skin is dark, but when she opens her mouth, you'll be pleasantly surprised."

He couldn't help it. He locked eyes with her. She was terrified, he could see, and he had been thrown for a loop here. He had _not_ been expecting this, by any stretch of the imagination. Intergalactic, planet-threatening thugs he could deal with; run-of-the-mill human scum were a different story. In some ways, this was much, much worse than what he was used to.

So, he had no particular plan. He decided to do whatever _she_ wanted, if he could find a way to speak to her. She was the one "in" this thing, she was the one currently being threatened, she was the one who knew what these Pallottola characters were capable of.

First he had to be sure of one thing, since he had been rather wrong in thinking that aliens were being trafficked as meat, as novelties, as pets or what-have-you. He could be wrong about _this_ as well. He decided to use the opportunity afforded him to make certain that all of these "aliens" were, in fact, human. Then he could proceed…

He stood up and took a step forward toward the red-haired girl. He put out his hands, and asked, "May I?"

On her behalf, one of the Pallottola brothers answered, "Of course you may."

He didn't wait for the girl herself to answer, he simply stepped forward and put his fingers gently on her temples. He gently probed her mind, just enough to know that she was indeed human. Her essence screamed fear and loathing, defeat and debasement, but she was human underneath it all. He wanted to tell her it would be okay, that he was there to get her out, but he dared not draw attention.

He did the same with the Vietnamese, the two Russians, and the Brazilian. The Pallottolas watched him with concern, but they did not stop him.

And then came Martha. Into her mind, he probed a bit deeper. And there, he found a locked chest, all memories, hopes and desires shut tightly away.

"Let me in," he said to her, just barely aloud, so, so softly.

She unleashed a heavy explosion of panic, dread and anger, and within her mind, he chided her, _"You're going to have to relax, or you're going to get us both killed."_

He felt her pulling her emotions in, trying to calm herself amid a sea of disquiet.

"_Tell me what to do," _he said to her silently.

"_Choose me," _she said. _"Choose me, or they will kill me tonight."_

"_Will they kill someone else if I don't choose them?"_

"_I have no idea. But if I'm compliant, they'll let you take me to another room."_

"_Can we talk there?"_

"_I think so."_

He took his fingers away from her temples. "I like this one," he said to Michael Pallottola.

The thug squinted at Martha. "Lucky for her," he said.

* * *

It was a small room, a restaurant office with a bed in it. And a bare wooden chair. And that was it. No lamps, no desks, no place to hang one's tie – nothing nice at all.

And as soon as the door was shut, the Doctor and Martha embraced as though they hadn't seen one another in a hundred years.

"Martha, I'm sorry," he moaned into the top of her head. "I am so, so sorry!"

"I'm the one who talked you out of applying for the job yourself, Doctor," she reminded him. "It's not your fault!"

He pushed her away from him, though clutched her shoulders tightly, looking her over. "Are you all right? Have they hurt you?"

"No, they haven't hurt me – yet."

"What about last night when you rang? Didn't someone cut you off? Sounded like someone grabbed you."

"That was some of the girls," she said. "Looking out for me. And themselves."

The Doctor fell silent, and sat down on the bed. "Martha, really. How are you? I mean, how many times have you had to…" he trailed off, unable to finish his thought.

"I haven't had to yet," she said. "This is my fourth time in The Room, and I've never been chosen. If you're not chosen four times in a row, you're deemed useless. Not worth the money it takes to keep you alive, I guess."

"I see. I'm guessing they don't put you out to pasture."

She shook her head gravely. "As I hear it, it's a bullet to the back of the head. To tell you the truth, until I saw it was you, I was sort of hoping I would die tonight, rather than have to do what they want me to do. And last night I saw a girl refuse. I'd rather the bullet." She looked away from him, and nearly gagged.

"What happened to her?"

"All four of the brothers raped her, and then kicked her to death while we watched." Martha had adopted a flat, expressionless tone.

The Doctor buried his eyes in both hands and swore.

Martha continued, "I don't think they meant to kill her. But they didn't exactly behave with finesse."

He took her hand and inspected the dark stains under her fingernails. "Is this her blood?"

Martha nodded. "I tried to pump some of the blood out of her lungs after they discarded her on the floor, but she'd been kicked in the head a few too many times, I guess. Eventually, she bled so much through her nose and mouth, I couldn't…" She stopped and sighed.

The Doctor stood up. "We will _make sure_ that this doesn't happen to anyone else."

"Doctor, what about all those men on the tapes we heard? They thought the same thing."

"They are not us."

She sighed. "I wish I had your confidence. Clearly they have eyes and ears everywhere…"

"Shh," he commanded. The Doctor seemed to become quite distracted all at once. He looked around the room with a narrow eye, very slowly, then his gaze came to rest on Martha. He didn't say anything, but he carefully extracted the sonic screwdriver from his breast pocket, and seemed to scan the room. Martha didn't hear any difference in frequency, but the Doctor clearly did. "Surveillance equipment," he muttered.

Martha's jaw dropped, though mostly for lack of any better reaction. She wasn't surprised, she was angry with herself for not realising it sooner. She began to pace. "Oh, this is… this is… blimey, Doctor, what do we do? I can't believe this…" Her voice was climbing in pitch every second, and the Doctor could hear the panic rising further and further. She glanced around, her eyes darting like a bird. "Where are they? Where are the cameras?"

"In the sprinkler heads, Martha," the Doctor answered calmly. He took her once again by the shoulders and made her sit down on the bed. "Please calm down."

"I can't," she protested, getting to her feet. "They have heard us. They can see us. They know what we're doing in here, and what we're _not _doing. I tell you, Doctor, these guys… if we do anything untoward, we're dead. Or enslaved, or whatever. Either way, I never see my family again, and you…"

"Martha, relax," he said, taking her again by the shoulders. "They probably just have cameras in here so they can post the footage on the internet or something. They're probably not even watching. Here, I'll show you."

He discreetly pointed the sonic up at the cameras, and Martha heard a click.

"Now, they're off," he told her. "I bet no-one will even…"

But just then, a door opened. It was one of the Pallottola brothers, though neither Michael nor Peter. "What's going on?"

"Oh," the Doctor said, genuinely surprised. "Nothing. We're just talking."

"The camera went out. What did you do?"

"Nothing," the Doctor repeated. "Like I said, we were just here talking…"

"Yeah well, she doesn't get paid to talk."

"I've paid for my time with her," protested the Doctor calmly.

"You know what you paid for, dandy boy, and the clock is ticking. So either do what you came here to do, or…" He was interrupted then by a screech on a walkie-talkie, and a voice saying something short and incomprehensible.

"Or?"

The thug narrowed his eyes at the Doctor, and got very close. "Are you a cop?" He pushed his hand into the inside of his black suit jacket, exaggeratedly reaching for his weapon.

"No, I'm not," answered the Doctor.

"Good. Then you'll have no problem with all this. You have twenty minutes, and then we'll need the room." With that, the large man exited, slamming the door shut behind him.

For a long moment, the Doctor and Martha were still.

"I say we make a run for it," Martha whispered.

"We can't," he said. "Not from here. I guess I underestimated these guys. We need a plan."

"We don't have time to discuss _a plan_," she insisted. "If you're not here to do what you paid to do, then they'll think you're a cop, and they'll kill you. Or they'll kill us both, and use the fact that you _might_ be a cop as an excuse!"

"I know."

She was sitting on the bed now, doing everything in her power not to pace. She was aware of the Doctor staring at her, but she didn't look up. A silence hung in the air.

And then the Doctor said, "Martha, they can't hear us."

"What? How do you know?"

"If they could hear us, they'd have come in here straight away, because we were talking about what they do to girls who don't get chosen, and it's clear now that we know each other, if they're listening."

"Oh," she realised. "You're right."

And before she could come to terms with her thoughts, the Doctor had hauled her to her feet. He had his arm thrown around her waist, and the other hand pressed to the back of her head. In a single, harsh move, he had her up on her tiptoes and he'd shoved his tongue in her mouth. She could not react, but rather let it all happen almost without her participation – she was so stunned.

Stunned but inflamed. Because despite it all, the danger, the fear, the disgust… here he was. The Doctor. And suddenly she was reminded that she wanted him, and always had. She hadn't thought about it in what felt, in this dank world of Pallottola, like ages, but now it was home to roost, right in her gut.

She was a little disgusted with herself for feeling this way _now_, at this moment of her life, in this room, under these circumstances. But from the looks of things, this _feeling_ might be incredibly advantageous to get them out of this pickle.

The kiss lasted about ten seconds, and then he pulled away and let his lips slide down the side of her face to nip at her neck.

"What are you doing?" she breathed, trying very hard to keep her voice even.

"They're not listening, but they're sure as hell watching," he replied, straight into her ear. "Let's discuss a plan."

"Now? I mean… _NOW_?" she asked, her knees melting beneath her as his tongue slid down the sensitive flesh beneath her earlobe.

"Yes, now," he whispered. He pushed her back until her body bent and she had no choice but to lie down. She worked her way up to the head of the bed, so she could rest her head on the pillow. The Doctor followed her movements and now sat upright, straddling her legs.

"Can you disarm their weapons?" Martha asked breathlessly as she watched him climb out of his jacket.

"How would I do that?" he asked, staring down at her with intensity and tugging at his tie.

"Like, with the sonic."

"Not all at once," he answered, now unbuttoning his shirt and climbing out of it. "And if I disarm one, then the others will start shooting."

"Well then," she said, gulping. She took a deep breath, martialing her nervousness. "Maybe we need to get one of them alone.." As she spoke, she reached up to unbutton and unzip his trousers. She distinctly saw and felt a certain hardening behind the brown pinstriped fabric when she did that. She heard the Doctor's breath hitch, and looked up and saw him gulp, just as she had a moment before.

"We could do that," he said, falling forward. He caught himself on his hands and stopped with his face just an inch away from hers. "But it's doubtful that each one of those guys only carries one weapon." He smashed his lips against hers once again, and probed her mouth with his tongue. It was a desperate, passionate moment, congruent with the urgency and fear they both felt, but once again, Martha felt torn over the surge of lust it brought on, in this, the strangest of places.

"You're probably right," she said, as he sat back up and began hastily to push her gold lammé dress up her body. She helped him get it over her head and toss it aside as she said, "Besides, the sonic is useless against knives."

The dress hit the floor and Martha stopped talking, and realised the Doctor was gazing down at her, looking her over. She was now lying beneath him in only the push-up bra and matching lace thong she had been "issued" for the occasion. Just at that moment, he seemed to realise he'd been caught staring, and his eyes snapped back to hers. "God, you're beautiful," he breathed.

The comment seemed to come from nowhere, and for a moment, she couldn't speak.

But she held his eye, and after a beat, she said, meekly, "Thank you."

He fell forward on her once again, and this time as he kissed her urgently, he extended his legs out behind him. He shifted his body and wormed his way between her legs, and she could feel it without a doubt: he was ready. Before she knew what was happening, he was reaching down and freeing himself the rest of the way from his trousers and pants.

"Are we really going to do this?" she asked as his lips found the crook of her neck again, and his tongue found her flesh.

"Unless you really don't want to," he said, never missing a beat, never pulling away from her sensitive flesh.

She didn't answer. But again, she gulped with nervousness, and anticipation.

He pushed himself up on his hands and looked down at her again. "Look, I think we're making this too complicated. How about, I pay for you to have a drink with me and come outside to kiss me good night. Then we run. Sound good?"

"Okay."

"Okay. But they'll never let us do even that much – may not even let us out of this room – if we don't do this first."

"I know."

"Stop me now if you don't want to."

Her eyes were as wide as saucers, and she shook her head. Her movement was slight, and the Doctor wasn't certain.

"Martha, this will make it _so_ much easier to escape, if I just do what they think I came for. But we _could _find another way, find a way to stall a bit longer…"

Again, she shook her head ever-so-slightly.

He reached down and moved her knickers aside. At that moment, if there was any doubt, it was gone. He could feel that she was as ready, willing and able as he was.

He experienced a surge of power when he touched her and found her so molten at her centre. He felt possessive, and couldn't resist: he slid two fingers inside, burying them in hot liquid, relishing in her obvious desire for him. She closed her eyes and moaned.

And then with one smooth movement forward, he pushed inside her and it was done. He moaned hard, and once again buried his mouth at the crook of her neck, before pulling his whole body back and driving straight home to her core a second time.

He repeated this voracious action a few times as he nipped increasingly hungrily at her neck, and he moaned her name in a way that might have made her melt, if she weren't already on fire. And he continued… he took her over and over, in the way he did everything: in epic, passionate master strokes that could very well save their lives.

She had had little idea of how swiftly she'd been burning, even as he'd been undressing and they'd been discussing disarming the Pallottolas' guns. But suddenly, after only a minute, she was climaxing, her entire body pulsing and flowing inward and then outward in waves of searing pleasure. She was reminded for the first time in far too long of how good this could feel, of how every lover is different, how every experience, every orgasm, even, could be different and a novelty. She had often felt,though, that the stars had to align perfectly in order to feel _this_ consumed and overtaken by a tide of heat – she reckoned the stars were aligning right now.

She climaxed largely, but quietly, with barely a moan escaping her lips. But the way she clutched at his arms, and threw her head back, and the way she throbbed from the inside out was unmistakable. "Good," he whispered as her body shuddered. "Just let it go."

She came down from her high, and felt sensitive and restless. One more time, she was reminded of the ways of the body, the internal rustlings and little explosions that happen in response to anther body. With the buzzing from her climax having just subsided, and the Doctor's passion growing quick and powerful, his thrusts forward were sending shock waves through her that went straight to her head. Her eyes went blurry, her fingertips tingled, her toes curled, her mouth was forced open.

Where normally, she would have let out a series of high-pitched cries to match the pitch of her body, she felt instead overwhelmed with emotion. She cried out just once with total abandon, frustration, fear, anger, happiness, all of the above, and then let out a sob. Tears spilled over unexpectedly then, and she turned her head away from him, to cover her eyes.

"No, don't do that," he whispered, taking her hand away from her face. "It's okay." And he continued to force her body further and further toward another major crisis as he gazed at her flooded eyes, wiped her tears with his thumbs and kissed her lips, cheek, forhead and neck.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, finding her body on the rise again. "I don't know why."

"It doesn't matter why," he whispered back, his lips less than a centimetre from her ear.

"I can't stop," she whipered again, feeling a sob well up behind her eyes, just as another climax welled up below.

"There's no reason to," he told her softly, never stopping, still kissing her, still engaging.

"Doctor, we still might die," she told him with a little sob, drowned by a sob of passion. "When we run away."

"I know, Martha," he responded, his voice growing thin, breathless, desperate.

"When we run, we'll be dodging bullets," she continued, her own voice thinning now.

"Dodging a bullet," he breathed. "That's what we're doing now, isn't it?"

She fell silent as her thoughts filled with the sounds of gunfire and the Doctor's breath in spurts, of feet pounding the pavement and their bodies pounding each other. She felt tears coming in tight, wiry waves, and pleasure coming on relentlessly like the tide, and all of it was threatening to crash, break her open at any moment. She saw death at the same time as love, blood and sex, and it all spun into one twisted web within her mind…

Suddenly, he said her name, strained, into her ear, and it brought her round. Her eyes flew open as another orgasm surprised her, and she heard a crackling grunt from him. Again, she felt her body yield, this time like a big, loud breaking wave.

And as he let go inside of her, let his own passion and anxiety fill her up, he could feel her giving way and losing composure. All around him, it seemed, she was thinking, crying and coming, and they both were out of control.

Because with this moment – this fantastic, opulent, luxurious moment in which two friends/lovers seal off their coupling and enjoy the utmost in satisfaction together – comes the realisation that now they had to deal with the difficult part: the escape.

* * *

A Monday Morning in New York

An Englishwoman, much changed from two weeks before, sat on a bench in Central Park. She was dressed in her own, non-shiny, non iridescent clothing, all of which covered the necessary parts, and all of which fit her well – even the shoes. The only thing she wore that was slightly uncomfortable and not her own, was the sling in which rested her right arm.

A man from another planet, dressed in a pin-striped suit, came round the corner with a white cup in each hand.

"They were out of chocolate syrup, so I got you vanilla," he said, handing her a cup.

"Thanks," she said, reaching up with her left hand.

He reached forward and touched her right shoulder. "How does it feel?"

"Like I got shot while running from restaurant-owners-slash-pimps with mob ties."

"Martha."

"It feels fine, as long as I don't move or breathe," she said.

He sat down beside her. "Aren't the drugs working?"

"Yeah, that's why I'm not still weeping," she told him. She looked at him and smiled a little, which was a major relief to him.

"I talked to Majewski while I was in line for coffee," he told her.

"Who?"

"My contact at the NYPD."

"Oh," she said, genuinely interested. "What did he say?"

"They've siezed the computers from the offices, including all the surveillance footage."

"And?"

"He's going to erase our part of the… montage. The rest he'll keep as evidence."

"Okay," she said, nodding. "What about the girls? Did he say anything about them?"

"The city is putting them up in a hotel until after the Pallottolas go to trial, and then they'll all be deported, I expect," he told her. "Which, I imagine, might be a welcome outcome for them."

"What about the…"

"The two who were hurt? Irina is going to be fine, she just got a knock to the head," he told her. "But Molly…"

"I guess it was her fourth time, too. You chose me. She…"

"Yeah, she was dead before you and I were even out of that room, I think."

"Damn it," she spat, as tears came to her eyes. "I saw her lying there when we were leaving, and… I should have known. Bastards."

"I know."

"No, seriously," she all but yelled. "Fucking bastards!"

"I know."

They both sighed heavily, and drank their coffee in silence for a couple of minutes.

After the moment had passed, he asked, "How about you? How are you? And I don't mean your shoulder."

"I'm… shaken."

He nodded. Then, "Do you remember what I said to you at the hospital, or were you too drugged-up to hear me?"

"No, I remember," she said, staring across the park at some kids running around beneath a giant tree.

"I didn't think you heard me."

"A fair assumption, considering I was about to have a piece of metal goudged out of my shoulder, but… Doctor, I couldn't ignore a thing like that."

"Have you given it much thought?"

Actually, it had been more than twenty-four hours, and she had not managed to think of much else. She told him the truth.

"I've thought about it at every moment since you said it."

A long pause. "Are you going to make me ask?"

She looked at him sadly. "Doctor, I.." then she lost her bravery for a moment, and stopped. Then she started again. "God, I can't believe I'm about to say this…"

"Uh-oh."

"I'm sorry. I just can't."

"Okay," he said, nodding a little to rigorously.

"It's too…"

"No, I understand."

"No, listen. For the past six months, I've done nothing but wish you would… say what you said, and ask me that question. Including, right up 'til the end. I mean, _the end_, Doctor, in that room, together, with you and me and… together. But when I think of it now, you and me together, I see…"

"…running and screaming?"

"Yep."

"Getting shot? Being scared for your life constantly?"

"Watching someone get raped and murdered."

"Being put on display?"

"And every other man and woman who had… _done what they were there to do _in that very room where we were, on that very bed. How many girls were sold and degraded in that room? How many disgusting men had gone in there and totally wrecked the spirit of some young woman with potential?"

"Yeah."

"You and I, we're special, we're lucky. We love each other… apparently. But I can't separate myself from _them_ right now."

"Okay."

"That's not to say that in a few…"

"Okay, Martha."

She fell silent. In all the times she had thought about the path to rejection for her and the Doctor, she had _never_ imagined the conversation going _this_ way.

Then she asked, "Will you ask me again in a few months?"

He was quiet for a while. He looked at her after way too long, and asked, "Do you want me to?"

"I do."

Again, he took a pause that was too long for comfort. "Okay. Maybe."

She sighed. "Okay. I guess that will have to do for now." Somehow, she felt certain that she had missed her chance, though. But the way things were, she just couldn't… couldn't.

Another pause. "Can we at least hold hands in the park?" he asked.

She smiled with a melancholy air. "Sure," she said, and she moved so that his long fingers could close round hers.


End file.
